(02-16-2019 10:24 AM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  The one thing I would worry about with NKU would be that if you take them, do you HAVE to contend with their venue? As in, clearly, this thing with Horizon and IUPUI was cause for conflict. In almost every other non-major conference, you are not going to get an arena like theirs...and they seem to know that. Is that trouble if you’re MVC, SoCon, CAA, or even the A10?

I only know what I read in the press release, but it seems that NKU is upset not so much about the decision (Indianapolis/IUPUI over NKU's bid) as the fact that it looks like the rules changed / the Horizon broke the rules of their bidding process. In the fall, Horizon said "no on campus arena", and then in the spring awarded the next 3 tournaments to IUPUI's arena. (NKU's bid was for a tournament at the Cincinnati's US Bank Arena, which is not where UC plays, and probably isn't as nice as NKU's court, since UC played their year at NKU). It's not that NKU is owed a tournament, it's that they're owed fairness in the tournament selection process.

NKU's arena is supposed to be nice, but I don't think even NKU partisans would say it's a cut above NBA/NHL quality arenas. So Arch Madness would be staying in St Louis, the A-10 would still be in Barclay's, or any number of NBA/NHL arenas in DC and Philadelphia.

SoCon? US Cellular Arena in Asheville opened in 1974, so NKU might look at it as a dump compared to their court.

(02-16-2019 10:24 AM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  The one thing I would worry about with NKU would be that if you take them, do you HAVE to contend with their venue? As in, clearly, this thing with Horizon and IUPUI was cause for conflict. In almost every other non-major conference, you are not going to get an arena like theirs...and they seem to know that. Is that trouble if you’re MVC, SoCon, CAA, or even the A10?

Their venue isn't going to imminent anybody in the MVC. Not with JQH Arena, Ford Center, Carver Arena, McLeod Center, etc. Maybe the high school gyms that we added in Valpo and Loyola. MVC just lost two major arenas in Creighton and Wichita State. So no NKU's arena isn't going to be the big dog arena in the MVC.

(02-16-2019 10:48 AM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(02-16-2019 10:24 AM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  The one thing I would worry about with NKU would be that if you take them, do you HAVE to contend with their venue? As in, clearly, this thing with Horizon and IUPUI was cause for conflict. In almost every other non-major conference, you are not going to get an arena like theirs...and they seem to know that. Is that trouble if you’re MVC, SoCon, CAA, or even the A10?

I only know what I read in the press release, but it seems that NKU is upset not so much about the decision (Indianapolis/IUPUI over NKU's bid) as the fact that it looks like the rules changed / the Horizon broke the rules of their bidding process. In the fall, Horizon said "no on campus arena", and then in the spring awarded the next 3 tournaments to IUPUI's arena. (NKU's bid was for a tournament at the Cincinnati's US Bank Arena, which is not where UC plays, and probably isn't as nice as NKU's court, since UC played their year at NKU). It's not that NKU is owed a tournament, it's that they're owed fairness in the tournament selection process.

NKU's arena is supposed to be nice, but I don't think even NKU partisans would say it's a cut above NBA/NHL quality arenas. So Arch Madness would be staying in St Louis, the A-10 would still be in Barclay's, or any number of NBA/NHL arenas in DC and Philadelphia.

SoCon? US Cellular Arena in Asheville opened in 1974, so NKU might look at it as a dump compared to their court.

The Asheville Civic Center was a dump even back in the early 90s, however, having the SoCon Tournament in Asheville provides a great experience as a neutral site that they tried to duplicate elsewhere, but couldn’t come close. The SoCon Tournament is the only time I sort of miss our old league. Sort of.

(02-15-2019 09:43 AM)johnbragg Wrote:  It's a lot easier to transform a commuter school into an undergraduate residential school than it is to transform a declining backwater town into an attraction for out-of-state full-tuition-paying students.

That's pretty ignorant. Bloomington-Normal not only has steady growth, but also has very low unemployment is is anchored by large companies and universities.

(02-15-2019 01:44 PM)MidWestMidMajor Wrote:  Since the Illinois directional schools affect 3 mid-major conferences (4 if we include UIC) and a G5, it is imperative that this fanboard solve this problem immediately. During a 3 hour drive on Interstate 80 this morning the answer came to me:

WIU becomes the premier teacher preparation school in the state led by the new slogan, "WIU - We teach excellence!"
NIU becomes an awesome business and IT school.
EIU becomes the public liberal arts school for Illinois.
SIU becomes "The Illinois School of Science and Technology".
UIC builds on its relationship with Chicago hospitals to become Illinois' health sciences and bio-research institute.
and ISU becomes the 2nd flagship for the state of Illinois.

There. It's done. Now we just need the funds from state government ...
...and that's the point everything comes to a crashing halt.

ISU would not be happy about Western being a better teaching school.

(02-16-2019 01:01 AM)DawgNBama Wrote:  Hey mods, can we split this topic from the NKU thread??? I believe it’s really interesting and deserves its own thread.


If it were me, I would make UIC the Illinois School of Science & Technology or the Illinois Institute of Technology. UIC’s Chicago location makes it a very good area to access, learn, and teach technology. Maybe merge SIU with the new Illinois Institute of Technology??

There's already an IIT.

(02-15-2019 08:51 AM)Cubsway99 Wrote:  Will Bloomington-Normal is better than places like Lafayette, E. Lansing, Ames, Manhattan, Stillwater etc where other second flagship schools are. To me, UIC is a commuter school that will be extremely expensive to expand while ISU has more open land and could create a I-74 educational corridor with U of I.

But many of those are Land Grant schools. UIUC is one of the original 37 Morrill Act Land Grant schools. It's a lot harder to build up your second university in your biggest city when it needs to have fields for field trials. The reason tOSU can afford it's agricultural research is the fields were there before Columbus grew that far out ... it wouldn't be practical to establish Ohio's Land Grant University as an extension of downtown Columbus today.

And the Land Grant act wasn't JUST Agricultural, it was an Agricultural and Industrial Development policy, which is why so many of the Morrill Act universities have such a strong STEM profile. It's Illinois's STEM focus that places it so high on the Shanghai List (#41 Worldwide, #28 US, 2016 #13 Engineering broad subject field), which attracts so many Chinese students, where the parents who can afford to send their students to the US to study tend to be very brand and status conscious. Raising either UIC or Illinois State to the "missing #2" school in Illinois would not duplicate the STEM focus.

As far as NKU, the only way I can see the MAC making a play for Olympic Sports adds is if the A10 gets raided but Dayton is left behind and Dayton decides that the MAC is a better conference for it to play in, and then they decide they need even numbers and NKU is the best available 14th. So real strong chance, there ... maybe 0.01%?

(02-16-2019 10:24 AM)The Cutter of Bish Wrote:  The one thing I would worry about with NKU would be that if you take them, do you HAVE to contend with their venue? As in, clearly, this thing with Horizon and IUPUI was cause for conflict. In almost every other non-major conference, you are not going to get an arena like theirs...and they seem to know that. Is that trouble if you’re MVC, SoCon, CAA, or even the A10?

The point was that the requirement for bids were no home courts, and then all of a sudden, it ends up on IUPUI's home court. UIC plays in one of the former arenas of the Bulls, Milwaukee plays in one of the former arenas of the Bucks, Cleveland State's arena can be really huge if they take the partitions away, Oakland is about to move into the Palace at Auburn Hills, and Wright State's arena can seat up to 12,000 when all of the sections are opened, so it's not like the Horizon League is short of arenas with big seating capacities. Prior to 2015, the Horizon League tournament was played entirely on home courts of league members, and I think that every other member school was ticked off when the Horizon League went with a home arena after being told no specifically on the bidding form. I think that most fan bases want the tournament back on home courts and not in a "neutral" site anyway.

The MAC and MVC are the envy of all mid-majors when it comes to conference basketball tournaments. The two conferences play in neutral site major league venues in Cleveland and St. Louis, respectively. The two cities are each located near the center of their conference footprint too.

What makes scheduling a week-long tourney at these locations easy though, is that each venue has only one major tenant; the Cleveland Cavaliers and the St. Louis Blues.

What hurt the Horizon League in establishing its tourney at Detroit's new Little Caesar's Arena, is that both the Red Wings and Pistons play there. That forced the HL to look elsewhere for a place to host its conference tourney.

(02-14-2019 04:15 PM)Cubsway99 Wrote:  It is stuff like this that makes me wonder if EIU, NIU, WIU and SIU are all open in 10 years, all of them have had their enrollments drop so much.

I think NIU will be alright, they're close enough to Chicago to make things work. SIU is struggling but has the Edwardsville campus to keep them afloat. WIU and EIU are the ones at the biggest risk, Chicago State is in horrible shape but it's very difficult to cut them with the politics around CSU.

(02-15-2019 10:19 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  There are a ton of graduates from high schools in Illinois at the University of Dayton and Miami University. In the past couple years Cincinnati is seeing an uptick as well (although not nearly to the levels those first two schools have--- I think Dayton may have more Illini than Ohio residents).

Yep. About a fifth of Miami's student body comes from the Chicagoland area, as opposed to in-state Ohio kids who make up close to 60%. Back in the early 2000s Miami pioneered the now common practice of giving high value scholarships to out of state students automatically if you had above a certain GPA and ACT/SAT as a way to combat OSU getting serious about their academics.